Burdett v. Teledyne Continental Motors involved the forced landing of a Beech Bonanza after the Teledyne Continental IO-550 engine installed in the aircraft came apart in cruise flight. The passenger was severely injured.
The National Transportation Safety Board blamed the engine failure on the mechanic who last worked on the engine, and cleared the engine
An A-Star AS350B air ambulance helicopter crashed November 14 at Doyle, California, killing the 
three crew members on board. According to an article in the Reno Gazette Journal, the pilot made a distress call before the crash. That indicates that the pilot was likely experiencing a mechanical emergency. The photographs accompanying the article show that the wreckage was spread over a fairly large area. That indicates that the pilot lost control of the helicopter well before he was able to attempt an emergency landing.
Under the circumstances, the NTSB will be looking at the helicopter’s Continue Reading Mountain Lifeflight EMS Helicopter Crash at Doyle, California
This past April, the NTSB called upon the FAA to ground the entire fleet of Zodiac aircraft because their wings tend to fall off in mid-flight. As it turns out, a defect in the Zodiac’s design induces an aerodynamic phenomenon known as flutter. Flutter can destroy a wing or other control surface in a matter of seconds.
The families of the victims of the Zodiac crash near Oakdale, California, have filed suit against the aircraft’s maker, Zenith Aircraft, alleging that the Zodiac’s design is defective. The Zodiac is the two-seat aircraft whose wings tend to break off in flight due to a design-induced aerodynamic phenomenon known as flutter. That appears
Maintenance manuals tell the mechanic when to perform an inspection or service, and how to perform it. Many mechanics believe that the regulations require them to follow the book exactly.
But in an excellent column on this murky subject, mechanic and aviation author Mike Busch sums up the regulatory requirements nicely:
The manufacturer’s “how-to” instructions
Compared to pilots in other countries, pilots in the US have extraordinary freedom. Of course, to keep commercial airliners safe from collisions, pilots of small aircraft are excluded from certain 
airspace near major airports unless they have first obtained a clearance from air traffic controllers. If a pilot obtains the necessary clearance, controllers will dictate the
The G36 Bonanza’s closest competitor is probably the Cirrus SR22. Would the outcome of this accident have been different had the Beechcraft been equipped with a ballistic parachute system, like the system installed in the Cirrus, depicted here? Probably not. For the Cirrus’ ballistic parachute to work, the plane needs at least 400 feet of altitude.
Bonanza N618MW, a Beechcraft like the one pictured below, was doing "touch & goes" at Jack Northrop field in Hawthorne. "Touch and goes" are practice landings where the pilot does not stop on the runway. Instead, after the wheels touch down, the pilot advances the throttle, takes off again, and then circles around for another landing. Everything appeared to be fine until, on one ofContinue Reading Beechcraft G36 Bonanza Crash At Hawthorne
place in